A Car Bomb Explosion Kills 23 Outside a Movie Studio in India

A car bomb exploded today at a movie studio here, killing 23 people and wounding 31 among a throng of movie-makers, fans and journalists.

The police said they suspected the bombing was the work of political rivals of the movie's producer, Paritala Ravi, a lawmaker in Andhra Pradesh state.

The car exploded as hundreds of people were leaving festivities for the start of filming at D. Rama Naidu studio in Hyderabad, 800 miles south of New Delhi. It punched a crater 6 feet wide and 2 feet deep in the ground outside the studio, spraying flesh, blood and splinters on streets and homes for hundreds of feet around.

A car carrying six television journalists took the brunt of the blast, which blew the vehicle several feet into the air, witnesses said. All six people in the car were killed.

The Hyderabad police chief, Ram Pratap Singh, said many of the injured lost limbs; seven were in serious condition. The wounded included the movie's star, Mohan Babu, a popular actor in the region's Telugu-language films.

The police found the engine of the car that carried the bomb and identified its owner, a government employee based in Bangalore, 300 miles south of Hyderabad. The police did not say whether he was suspected in the attack.

There was no claim of responsibility. Mr. Singh said he thought the target was Mr. Ravi, whose nose was broken in the blast.

Political leaders in this southern state often have their own private armies to settle scores. Mr. Ravi, a former guerrilla leader who had been a member of the People's War Group, which is fighting to create a separate Maoist state in the region, now belongs to the state's governing Telugu Desam party. He renounced guerrilla warfare about 10 years ago and was pardoned in return for his surrender.